Friday, 19 December 2014

I just returned from my vacation in Australia. It was a wonderful time spend with my family. Shortly back from my trip, Tovolo sent me these interesting and functional tools, some are from the 2015 range and are not available in our local market yet. I am so happy and excited with my new kitchen toys! You will see some of it in action in today's tutorial photos.

Friday, 28 November 2014

When I saw this Whipping Cream Pound Cake recipe at Fion's blog, I immediately bookmarked it. I had an opened pack of whipping cream, about a quarter left after making our family's favourite Homemade Matcha Ice-Cream. As whipping cream has to be used up within 3 days after opening, this recipe comes in really handy. I baked a blueberry pound cake using the left over whipping cream and really love the smooth and moist texture of the cake! After uploading this post, I will be off to the airport with my family for our vacation in Down Under, will be back blogging again in two weeks time! 当我在Fion的部落格看到这鲜奶油磅蛋糕的食谱时，就马上记下来了。因为冰箱里还有剩下四份之一的动物鲜奶油等着我来消费。我用这食谱烤了蓝莓磅蛋糕，质感好滑顺，蛮喜欢的！上载这帖子后，我将与家人赶去机场搭飞机，开始我的度假旅程，两星期后再回来。

Glad to conduct my 5th guest blogger workshop last Saturday where the participants get a hands-on baking Baking Taitai's creation of a delicious, soft and fluffy Matcha chiffon swiss roll with cookies and cream fillings. After which it was transformed into a Christmas snowy log cake. I am really happy to know that the participants have enjoyed the class by reading the feedbacks given below. :)

Friday, 21 November 2014

Last Saturday, I baked this French Almond cake as a present for a good friend son's birthday. I have chosen this non-cream cake knowing that her 5 year-old does not fancy cakes with cream. I started with the intention to bake one 8 inch cake which this recipe calls for. It turned out to be quite a short cake as it didn't rise much during baking. Looking at the nicely baked but flat cake, I deem it not presentable to give away as gift. I quickly measured out the ingredients from the same recipe and baked it in a 6 inch round pan. The second bake gave a better height and together with the first bake, I turned it into a 2 tier cake which I am rather pleased with. 上星期六，烤了这法国杏仁蛋糕给好朋友的5岁小儿子作为生日礼物。这小朋友不喜欢有奶油的蛋糕，所以我选择做了这款香香又弥漫着浓浓杏仁味的蛋糕送给他。原本打算照着食谱做一个8寸的蛋糕，但烤出来的蛋糕蛮矮的，觉得不体面。我赶快用同样的食谱再烘了另一个蛋糕。第二次用的是6寸圆形烤模，烤出来的高度刚刚好。我把两个蛋糕叠起来后，还真满意呢！

Friday, 14 November 2014

Yesterday was the last day of school term for my little boy. When he came home, he was kind of sad as he would not be going back to the holding school where the Primary 1 and 2 students are attending this year due to the school construction of an indoor sports hall and classroom blocks at the main school campus. I know he would miss the Chess corner most as that's where he and his good friends would play chess (moving giant Chess pieces which are slightly shorter than the children but light weight) every morning before lessons starts.

Tuesday, 11 November 2014

Few weeks ago, when I attended my Bible Study Fellowship (BSF) lunch gathering, my group leader Sharon brought a batch of brownies baked by her 12 year-old daughter. After I tried it, I fell in love with this plain old brownie and requested for the recipe. Sharon is kind to share this recipe which her daughter has gotten when she was in kindergarten. It is her girl's favourite brownie recipe and she often bakes it for occasions and give away as gifts.

Friday, 7 November 2014

When Amy of CHOCOLATE-CHIP-SISTERS.COM approached me few days ago to try out their range of premium chocolates in my bakes, I was more than happy to do so. Being a dark chocolate lover, I must have my daily dose of dark chocolate as it keeps me happy and healthy. Besides that, the Malagos Chocolates which I have received are 100% pure and natural, NO gluten, Non-GMO, No preservatives or artificial colouring, No dairy and No nuts. It is also of single-origin made from ethically grown and processed beans that have been carefully graded (according to international standards), fermented and solar-dried. That gives it a distinct flavour as is expected of chocolates that come from a single kind which makes any bake or drink stands out.

Wednesday, 5 November 2014

6 lovely ladies (L to R) Priscilla, Joane, Cecilia, Cheryl, Jolyn and Michelle joined me for an afternoon of fun bake-along session on 1 November 2014

Last Saturday, I conducted my 4th guest blogger workshop with LessonsGoWhere and the participants had fun baking a delicious, soft and fluffy chiffon swiss roll and transforming into a Christmas snowy log cake. Here's sharing some photos taken during the workshop.

Demo session

Working in pairs for peer teaching.

Some in full concentration, some stopped for a pose. :)

Participants with their lovely creations!

Thanks to E-Fei of LessonsGoWhere and Lena of the The Baking Loft who have been great assistants to me and my dear hubby for capturing pictures of these special moments during the workshop. Not forgetting to thank Brandt who has sponsored the recipe books - 'Simple Pleasures from the Kitchen' which I had given each participant a copy to bring home and Tovolo Singapore for sponsoring the baking tools.

Friday, 31 October 2014

This is my last pumpkin post of the month. In support of the LTU October pumpkin event, I have the opportunity to try out these pumpkin recipes - Pumpkin Tofu Cheesecake Jar, Pumpkin Ondeh Ondeh and Pumpkin Hokkaido Chiffon cupcakes for the past few weeks. Today I am going to share with you my latest successful experiment of this 50 minutes Amazing pumpkin buns. About half a year ago, when I discovered the 40 minutes bun recipe, I thought it was really amazing as you can churn bread out in such a short time. However, this 40 minutes bread recipe uses too much yeast and those who have tried find the texture to be dense and sticky by the next day. My experiment 2 days ago proved to be a champion over the 40 mins bread recipe as I have used the super food pumpkin to recreate a new quick bread recipe which uses much less yeast and is healthier too. This quick bread recipe takes all in all less than an hour to churn out homemade bread compared to normal bread making which requires more than 3 hours, amazing isn't it?

Friday, 24 October 2014

I am sure the Hokkaido chiffon cupcakes are not unfamiliar with many. My first attempt of these light cotton small chiffon cakes with a cream centre was a couple of years ago. I remembered making them for a family gathering and it was well received. This is my second attempt and I am making them in pumpkin flavour. This is made specially for my little boy who has just passed his ABRSM Grade 2 violin exam with a Merit result. You know, the night before the exam, he was so fearful and cried as it was his first violin exam. I took almost an hour to calm him down and assured him that everything would be fine. Moreover, mummy here would be accompanying him into the examination room to play the piano accompaniments for the three tested pieces. Thank God that he did not back out of the violin exam the next day and we played a good duet for the examiner. Well done boy!

Monday, 20 October 2014

I am pleased to announce my upcoming baking workshop on the Christmas Log Cake. Do come and join me for a fun afternoon of hands-on baking a Matcha Chiffon Cake with homemade Cookies and Cream fillings and transforming it into a Snowy Log!

Friday, 17 October 2014

Ondeh Ondeh, a traditional Malay and Nonya Kueh which is made of boiled glutinous rice balls filled with gula melaka and coated with grated coconut is like the Asian version of a Molten Lava Cake. As you bite into these chewy glutinous rice balls, the melted gula melaka will ooze out and lingers in your taste buds with sweetness and fragrance. It is usually made in pandan or sweet potato flavour. To support the pumpkin LTU event this month, I have made it in pumpkin flavour. My little boy who is not a fan of pumpkin, loves this kueh so much that he ate 9 pieces at one go! :)

Wednesday, 15 October 2014

It has been more than a week since I started using Tovolo tools in my baking and cooking. Its bright lovely colours have not only brighten up my kitchen and my mood, it has also fascinated my children with its fun and innovative designs. When I was baking the black bottom cupcakes using the Tovolo products for the first time, my little boy was so keen to help. He enjoyed using the cupcake pen and cupcake scoop to dispense the batter into the cupcake moulds as it was really easy for him to handle. Two days later, when I made the Oreo Cream Cheese cupcakes, my girl was attracted to the Tovolo tools and offer to help too. My new Tovolo tools have caused great fun bonding time with my kids as they are more interested to get involve in the food preparation. :)

Thursday, 9 October 2014

This pan fried radish cake is one of my family's favourite tim sum and we will always order it when we go for yum cha in restaurants. This radish cake can be eaten either steam or pan-fried. We prefer the pan-fried version as it has a thin crunchy layer on the outside from frying, and soft on the inside. The ones sold locally are usually the Hong Kong style which uses Lup Cheong (chinese sausage) as one of its ingredients. The Taiwanese version uses ground pork instead and I decided to give it a try after seeing the recipe in Carol's book. It turns out to be just as nice. Do give this version a try if you haven't tasted it before.

Friday, 3 October 2014

If you have read my last post on the Black Bottom Cupcakes, you would have known that I felt really sorry for dropping the birthday cake that I have made for my son's 7th birthday last Sunday. To make up for this, I have baked a batch of Oreo cheese cupcakes for him and try to fulfil what he had requested earlier on - an Oreo Cream Cheese cake. Together with my girl, we have decorated it and transformed it into cute animals as she wanted to surprise her little brother. Some looked like mice, some looked like doggies, what do you think? :D上一个帖子，我有提到我不小心把做个儿子的生日蛋糕掉落在地上，感到好愧疚喔！都是因为赶时间和太累的关系，所以导致儿子要求的奥利奥芝士蛋糕给砸烂了！还好他蛮懂事，还反过来安慰我说没关系，我们还有之前做的黑底杯子蛋糕呢！为了补偿我的过失，做了这些奥利奥芝士杯子蛋糕给他。女儿为了给弟弟惊喜，还帮我把它打扮一番，变成可爱的小动物呢！ 有些看起来像小老鼠，有些像小狗，你认为呢？

Tuesday, 30 September 2014

Two days ago was my son's 7th birthday. He had requested for an Oreo Cheesecake to celebrate with our church friends during our cell group meeting the night before his birthday. I did a 9 inch non-baked one as requested. As I was rushing for time, plus the fatigue in me had caused me to accidentally drop the whole cake before I could even take any photo of it!!! /OMG

Monday, 29 September 2014

Have you ever seen such colourful kitchen tools which will brighten up one's kitchen? I haven't seen it locally until two weeks ago at Jems Robinsons shop front. I was so excited to see many lovely and well designed kitchen tools which are not only useful for my baking needs but also put a smile and cheer me up with its colourful element of fun added to it! I immediately fell in LOVE with it! Wouldn't you love to own such premium quality and functional kitchen tools and add fun to your baking and cooking?

Friday, 26 September 2014

I have been trying out my electric steam oven to steam cupcakes but have failed several times as the cupcakes simply did not rise and collapsed instead. Finally, after trying out this steam moist chocolate cake recipe which I found online last week, it worked on my Brandt steam oven, not only did it rise, it exploded somehow and had a cute mushroom head. :D I love its unique look, quite unusual from the neat looking cupcake. The cupcakes are chocolatey rich, super moist and not too sweet. Great for chocolate lovers like me! :)

Monday, 22 September 2014

I hosted my third guest blogger Magic Custard Cake (MCC) and German Butter Cookies workshop two days ago. As usual, I will bake the original and one other flavoured magic custard cake for my participants to sample to have an appreciation of the finished product before they attempt to bake one. I was adventurous and wanted to try a new flavour which no one has tried before, hence the birth of the Gula Melaka magic custard cake. Gula Melaka is dark palm sugar made from the sap of a Palmyra palm and has its own distinct taste. It is mainly used in the local desserts and cakes of the Southeast Asian region.

In this recipe, I have replaced all the icing sugar with gula melaka and the method is slightly different from the original recipe. The result is a flavourful and fragrance cake. My hubby commented that it is the best flavour among all the magic custard cakes I have made so far. I am on cloud nine as I could achieved the three magical layers after trying my own ways of incorporating the gula melaka into the cake batter. My least favourite dense kueh bottom is also just a thin layer, hooray!!! :D =D>

Thanks to E-Fei of LessonsGoWhere and Lena of the The Baking Loft who have been great assistants to me and my dear hubby for capturing pictures of these special moments during the workshop. Not forgetting to thank Brandt who has sponsored the recipe books - 'Simple Pleasures from the Kitchen' which I had given each participant a copy to bring home.

Thursday, 18 September 2014

In support of my blogger friend, Fion of XuanHom's Mom Kitchen Diary, who is hosting the Chocolate Wonderland theme this month, you will see more chocolate recipe from me. Those who have been following me will know that besides a matcha lover, I am also a great chocolate lover especially dark ones, I love dark chocolate to the extend that I must have at least a bite a day or I will feel that something is missing or not right! :))

Friday, 12 September 2014

Yesterday was my darling daughter's 13th birthday. She has requested for a non-cream, simple chocolatey cake with Oreo cookies and marshmallow. I found one recipe on the web which fits her description but has modified greatly to come up with a healthier and low sugar version. The result is a chocolatey, fudgy and not so sweet cake which I like. It is a quick and easy, fuss free cake with minimal washing as you only need a hand whisk and spatula to do the mixing. Here's the cake which I have assembled for her and glad she likes it.

Friday, 5 September 2014

When I first saw this recipe at Zoe's blog, I thought it's really interesting as it differs from the usual mooncakes which use lotus paste as fillings and I bookmarked it right away! :) When I saw it at Karen's blog few days ago, I was even more determined to try it out! This baked custard mooncakes are really popular in Hong Kong and are selling like hot cakes! Thanks to Master Chef Ye ( 葉潤發師傅) who is the creator of this delectable pastry mooncake. He was inspired by the Fried Custard Bun (炸奶黃包)which was so well received in the hotel restaurant where he used to work and successfully created the mooncake version after his tenth attempt. The mid-autumn festival is just around the corner, here's wishing everyone 中秋节快乐！

Friday, 29 August 2014

I have never like GongZaiPeng 公仔饼 (meaning picture or doll biscuit in Cantonese) since young . My impression of them is a type of mooncake biscuit without lotus paste and shaped usually like a piggy and sold in a small basket. When I saw this special Peach Doll Mooncake at Kimmy's blog, I immediately bookmarked it. This recipe is different from the normal ones as lotus paste is mixed together with other ingredients to form the dough. I knew it's gonna be different with the addition of lotus paste, it will surely be tastier!

Thursday, 28 August 2014

After making a batch of healthy Snowskin mooncake(without shortening) last week, I have set aside time to bake these chocolate mooncakes yesterday. I love especially the heart shape ones which says, "I love you" in mandarin. These of course are meant for my the other half. :)

Friday, 22 August 2014

Made these healthy snow-skin mooncakes two days ago. The tri-colour skin was inspired by my Cute Caterpillar Cookies recipe. I have adapted this recipe from my Rainbow Snow-skin mooncakes which do not use any shortening at all. As one who advocates healthy eating, I avoid using unhealthy ingredients like shortening if possible. I have replaced the shortening with extra virgin olive oil and it did not compromise on the skin texture as it is still soft and chewy. For this recipe, I have used HK Black sesame paste from Kwong Cheong Thye. ($12 for a 1 kg pack). I love the great selection of mooncake paste there!前两天做了这些健康的冰皮月饼。三色冰皮的灵感是来自我的可爱毛毛虫饼干食谱。这个配方是取自我的彩虹冰皮月饼，也是免用白油的。我觉得白油不健康，所以从来都不用它。在这个食谱，我用特级初榨橄榄油来取代，完全没影响冰皮嚼劲和柔软的质感。包裹的馅料是在广祥泰买的香港黑芝麻蓉。（一公斤包装 $12）。

I have the opportunity to conduct my second guest blogger Magic Custard Cake (MCC) and German Butter Cookies workshop two days ago due to demand after conducting my first blogger MCC baking workshop last month. I started the session by introducing the MCC and explaining how the magic took place during baking. As most would not have heard of or eaten this cake before as it is not sold in any bakery, I baked the original and chocolate flavoured ones this round for my participants to sample so that they have an appreciation of the finished product before they attempt to bake one.

After the introduction and tasting of the mcc, I gave a detailed demonstration before the participants proceeded to do a hands-on.

As you can see, we all had a fun filled afternoon baking together...

.....in a relax and cosy environment. :)

Anticipating for the magical moment while we examined the MCC that I did as part of the demonstration. Wow... THREE distinct layers of a souffle top, custard middle and kueh base!!! (love that top right hand photo below! :)) )..... tasting of cake and cookies freshly out of the oven over a cup of fruit tea while waiting for the bakes to be done.

Checking the sides of the cake for the magical 3 layers....see the happy smiles? Hooray!!! =D>

I would like to thank Ethan of LessonsGoWhere and Lena of the The Baking Loft who have been great assistants to me and my dear hubby for capturing pictures of these special moments during the workshop. I also want to thank Brandt for sponsoring the recipe books - 'Simple Pleasures from the Kitchen' which I had given each participant a copy to bring home.

I will be hosting my third MCC workshop in September. If you would like to join, you may indicate your interest by clicking on this link here so that you will be given priority when the workshop opens for registration.

Friday, 15 August 2014

Blueberries are in season and abundance this month. I used to pay $4.95 for a punnet of 125 grams. It has been on special promotion at supermarkets for the past weeks and cost about $2.50 per punnet. I bought 12 punnets at one go and half of it went into our stomachs (2 adults and 2 kids) in one day! You see, the blueberries we get here in Singapore are imported from the United States, thus they do not have a long shelf life and turn mouldy easily. So, we have to consume it as soon as possible.

Baking Supplies Stores in Singapore

Crosspost

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Baking Taitai is a personal blog written and edited by Cheryl Lai. The views and opinions expressed on this blog are purely the blog owner. Cheryl is not an expert, just a happy homebaker with great passion for baking and sharing her experience and experiments. The bakes are mostly her first attempt, tried and tested by her and done successfully as per blog tutorial recipe and videos.

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